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Ozone loss over South Pole
down 30%
RIA
Novosti
Thursday October 04, 2007
Ozone
loss over the South Pole has seen a 30% reduction this year, the
European Space Agency (ESA) said in a press release on Wednesday.
According to data from the agency's Envisat satellite, the South
Pole's ozone layer has lost approximately 27.7 million metric
tons this year, compared to 2006's record of 40 million metric
tons.
The size of the hole is now estimated at 24.7 million sq km (15
million sq miles) - equivalent to the size of the North America
- against 29.5 million sq km (18 million sq miles) last year.
"Although the hole is somewhat smaller than usual, we cannot
conclude from this that the ozone layer is recovering," the
press release quotes a senior project scientist at Royal Dutch
Meteorological Institute, as saying.
He explained the phenomenon by the fact that this year's hole
was less centered on the South Pole, and that the inflow of warm
air which prevents the ozone from depleting was more intensive.
(Article continues below)
The ozone hole, first recognized in 1985, occurs during the Antarctic
spring, from September to November or December. The overall cause
is chlorine-containing gas that in sunlight splits into highly
ozone-reactive radicals and breaks ozone down into individual
oxygen molecules. One molecule of chlorine can theoretically split
thousands of ozone molecules.
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